XXIII
That first night the party slept at Valence in the Maison des Têtes, the quaint old house with its unique façade which stands to this day in the Grand’ Rue, and which in that year of grace 1794 had been requisitioned by the Drôme section of the Committee of Public Safety for its offices. A concierge with wife and family were in charge of the house and there were two or three additional rooms in it which were often placed at the disposal of any official personage who happened to be passing through Valence. Chauvelin had often stayed there on his way through to Paris and was a familiar figure to the concierge and his family; there was no difficulty whatever in finding accommodation for himself and his two friends in the Maison des Têtes for the night. Calèche and horses, together with driver and postilion, were put up in the stables at the back of the house.
Night had overtaken the party when some five kilometres outside Valence, and this last part of the way had to be done at walking pace. Thus it was nearly ten o’clock before the calèche drew up in the Grand’ Rue outside the Maison des Têtes, and the concierge, hurrying to greet the unexpected and important guest, had regretfully to inform him that neither the President nor any of the officials were here to welcome him as they had already gone to their respective homes. But the rooms were there, quite ready, at the disposal of Citizen Chauvelin and his friends, and supper would be got immediately for them. The three travellers stepping out of the calèche were more than thankful to find shelter and food at this hour. Already at sunset the sky had been threatening; great banks of cloud came rolling up from the southwest, driven by tearing gusts of wind; by nighttime a few heavy drops were falling, presaging the coming storm. No sooner were the travellers installed in the dining-hall in front of an excellent supper, than the storm broke in all its fury. It was accompanied by torrential rain and a tearing wind. Such wild weather during the month of May was almost unparalleled in the valley of the Rhône, so the concierge hastened to explain to the two strangers who accompanied Chauvelin. The night was very dark too, the very weather in fact for footpads and malefactors who, alas! infested the countryside more than ever now.
“What would you?” the man added with a shrug, “so many are starving these days; they get their existence as best they can. Honesty is no longer the best policy.”
And then he caught Citizen Chauvelin’s eye, and nervously clearing his throat, began to talk of something else. It was not prudent to grumble at anything, or to make any remark that might be constructed into criticism of the present tyrants of France.
Supper drew to an end, mostly in silence. Chauvelin was never of a loquacious turn of mind, and neither of the other two were in a mood to talk. After a curt good night the latter retired to the room which had been assigned to them. Chauvelin before doing the same gave orders to his driver and postilion to have the calèche at the door by seven o’clock on the following morning. Then he too went to bed, there to toss ceaselessly through the endless hours of wakefulness, his mind tortured with thoughts of his darling Fleurette, wondering how she would bear this first night in prison, the propinquity, the want of privacy, the lewd talk perhaps, or coarse jests of some of her roommates. It was only in the early dawn that, wearied at last in body and mind, he was able to close his eyes and snatch an hour or two’s sleep.
When the concierge brought him a steaming mug of wine in the early morning, his first inquiry was after the calèche. Was it being got ready?
Yes! the concierge had seen the driver and postilion at work this hour past. Everything would doubtless be ready for a start by seven o’clock. It was now half-past six. Chauvelin drank the hot wine eagerly; his sleepless night and all his anxiety had produced a racking headache and a state of mental inertia difficult to combat. Slightly refreshed by the drink, he proceeded to dress. While he did so he heard a great clatter of horses’ hoofs striking the cobblestones, a good deal of shouting and rattling of wheels. His windows gave on the Grand’ Rue, and looking out he expected presently to see the calèche being driven round from the stable-yard at the back. But nothing came. He felt nervy and impatient, hoping that nothing would go wrong. Angered too with himself for feeling so flat on this very morning when he would need all his brainpower to carry his scheme successfully to the end.
He intended journeying with the two men as far as Lyons, and there to invent a pretext for separating from them, sending them on to Paris by the stagecoach, and then returning quietly and secretly to Orange alone. Already he was fully dressed and ready to go downstairs. He heard the clock in the tower of St. Apollinaire striking seven. A minute or two later the concierge, wide-eyed and babbling incoherently, came bursting into the room.
“Citizen! Citizen! Nom de nom, quel malheur!” These ejaculations were followed by a string of lamentations, and a confused narrative of some untoward event out of which the only intelligible words that struck clearly on Chauvelin’s ears were: “Calèche,” and “cursed malefactors!” His questions remained unanswered; the man continuing to lament and to curse alternately.
Finally bereft of all patience, Chauvelin seized him by the shoulder and shook him vigorously.
“If you don’t speak clearly, man,” he said roughly, “I’ll lay my stick across your shoulders.”
The man fell on his knees and swore it was not his fault.
“I could not be in two places at once, citizen,” he lamented. “I was looking after your two friends and my wife—”
Chauvelin raised his stick. “What is it that was not your fault?” he shouted at the top of his voice.
“That your calèche has been stolen, citizen!”
“What?”
“It is those cursed brigands! They have infested the town these past—”
The words died in his throat in a loud cry of pain. Chauvelin had brought his stick crashing upon his back.
“It was not my fault, citizen,” he reiterated protesting. “I could not be in two places at once—”
But Chauvelin no longer stayed to listen. Picking up his hat and coat, he hastened downstairs, to be met in the corridor by the concierge’s wife and two sons all incoherent and lamenting. The whole house by now was astir. Public Prosecutor Isnard came clattering down the stairs followed by President Legrange, both in more or less hastily completed toilette. And thus the whole party with Chauvelin en tête proceeded at full speed to the stable yard, where the yawning coach-house and empty stalls told their mute tale. Of calèche, horses, driver or postilion not a sign. The stable man, an old fellow, and his aid, a very young lad, were busy at the moment telling the amazing story to a small crowd of gaffers and market-women who had pushed their way into the yard from the back and were listening, open-mouthed, to a tale of turpitude and effrontery, unparalleled in the annals of Valence.
At sight of Chauvelin and his tricolour sash, the crowd of gaffers and women respectfully made way for him, and he, seizing the old stableman by the shoulder, commanded him to tell him clearly and briefly just what had happened. Thus it was that at last he was put in possession of the facts that touched him so nearly. It seems that his own driver and postilion, up betimes, had got the calèche and horses quite ready and standing in the middle of the yard. They had in fact just put the horses to, and the postilion and driver were standing by the calèche door drinking a last mug of wine, when from the narrow lane which connects the yard with the rue Latour at the back, a band composed of four ruffians came rushing in. Before he, the stableman, could as much as wink an eyelid, three of these ruffians had seized the driver and postilion round their middle and thrust them into the calèche, followed them in, banged the coach door to, whilst the fourth climbed up to the box with the rapidity of a monkey, gathered up the reins and drove away.
In the meanwhile the lad who had been at work in the stables and heard the clatter came running out. Stableman and lad then ran to the lane and out into the rue Latour, only to see the calèche rattling away at breakneck speed. They shouted and strained their lungs to attract the notice of passersby, and they did attract their attention, but before they could explain what had happened, the calèche was well out of sight. The lad ran as fast as he could to the nearest poste de gendarmerie, but before the gendarmes could get to horse, no doubt those ruffians would have got well away with their booty.
That was in substance the story to which Chauvelin had to listen, and through which he was forced to keep his temper in check. As soon as the stableman had finished speaking, the lad had put in his own comments, whilst the gaffers and gossips started arguing, talking, conjecturing, giving advice, suggesting, lamenting. Oh! above all lamenting! That the high roads were not safe, everyone knew that to his cost. Masked highway robbers held up coaches, attacked pedestrians, robbed and pillaged the countryside. That the streets of Valence were not safe was, alas! only too true. The gendarmerie was either incompetent or venal, and lucky the man who possessed nothing that could be taken from him. But this outrage today in broad daylight surpassed anything that had been seen or heard before. A calèche and pair, pardieu! was not like a purse that could be hidden in one’s waistcoat pocket. And so on, and so on, while Chauvelin, still silent and curbing his impatience, went back into the house, followed by his crestfallen friends and by the staff of the Maison des Têtes still lamenting and protesting their innocence and withal beginning to feel doubtful as to what the consequences might be to themselves of this untoward adventure.
The stable-lad was then sent back to the poste de gendarmerie, with orders from Citizen Representative Chauvelin that the chief officer in charge present himself immediately at the Maison des Têtes. Whilst waiting for this officer, Chauvelin, sitting in the small parlour, had a few moments’ peace in which to coordinate his thoughts. The inertia which had weighed upon his spirits the first thing in the morning had been suddenly dissipated. Already his keen, imaginative brain had seized upon this catastrophe, and planned how to turn it to the furtherance of his scheme. And while his friends, no whit less voluble or more coherent than the concierge or his kind, were loudly lamenting: “What a misfortune, citizens! what bad luck!” and throwing up their arms in utter helplessness, Chauvelin broke in impatiently upon their wailings:
“We must make the best of it, citizens,” he said, “I shall certainly be held up here a day or two, on this stupid business, but it certainly need not detain you. The stagecoach leaves for Lyons at half-past eight if I mistake not. As soon as my calèche is recovered, which I doubt not it will be in a couple of days, I’ll follow you on. You in the meanwhile can proceed to Paris all the way by the stagecoach. It will be perhaps not quite as comfortable as my calèche, but it will serve.”
They demurred a little. The stagecoach would certainly not be as comfortable as Citizen Chauvelin’s luxurious calèche, and perhaps a day or two’s delay would not be very serious.
“It would be fatal,” Chauvelin said emphatically. Orders from Paris such as they had received must be obeyed in the least possible delay, a couple of days idling in Valence, when a stagecoach was available, would certainly be put down to pusillanimity and want of zeal.
He could be eloquent when he liked, could Citizen Chauvelin, and on this occasion he was determined to gain his point—to send these two packing, post-haste, off to Paris, and leave himself free to return to Orange immediately. As to what would happen presently, when those two arrived in Paris and found that they had been hoaxed, that they had not been sent for, and would have to return biting the dust and chewing the cud of their wrath, as to that in truth, Chauvelin had not given a thought. To save his Fleurette, to get her away out of the country, at the cost of his own life if need be, was all he thought about, and while the business of trying and condemning prisoners was at a standstill through the absence of these two men, there was a hundred to one chance that he could accomplish his purpose.
Therefore he put forth all his powers of persuasion—and they were great. He drew lurid pictures of what happened to those who were thought to be guilty of dilatoriness or want of zeal. So much so that he reduced President Legrange and Public Prosecutor Isnard—at no time very valiant heroes—to a state of abject fear, and half an hour later had the satisfaction of bidding them au revoir, in the yard of the posting-inn, they having found seats in the stagecoach to Lyons.
As soon as he had seen the last of them, he made haste to requisition a chaise and the only horses to be had in Valence, to take him forthwith to Orange.
As for his own calèche, he wished the footpads joy in its possession and cared less than nothing what became of his driver or his postilion.